LARTS 371 — Out in America: Culture, Sexuality, and Gender Since the 1960s

3 credits
Fall
Anthony Lioi

Questions of gender and sexuality have always been a feature of American literature, television, and film. However, in the wake of the 1960s, these American arts participated in the rebellion against traditional gender identities and sexual norms that continues today. This course will examine some of the major issues raised by feminist and LGBTQ+ artists in the last fifty years. Is the American system of gender merely a prison? If so, can it be escaped? How do communities of sexual rebellion organize and sustain themselves? How do artistic counter-cultures manifest political power? And how can we ask these questions intersectionally, through encounters with race, class, religion, and place? In order to address these questions, the arts will be put into conversation with feminist, Indigenous, and queer theory.